When starting a business, especially in an industry dominated by retail giants, demand is everything. Jeffrey Klimkowski, co-founder and CFO of DUDE Products — the manufacturer of DUDE Wipes — found himself in "post-college purgatory" with his roommates when they decided to go all-in on their idea of marketing wipes to men.
At the time, Klimkowski was living what he thought was his dream as an investment banker, but soon found himself dedicating whatever time and money he could to building this idea he and his friends had conjured up. Eventually, the balancing act became too much, leading him to leave his dream job and commit full-time to the company.
A pivotal moment came when they secured crucial funding from Shark Tank’s billionaire investor Mark Cuban, despite facing numerous rejections from venture capitalists prior. "Everyone told us no, we went around asking everyone for money. We struggled to get investors at first," Klimkowski recalled. “They said we needed an ungodly amount of capital to compete, so we knew we had to get profitable.”
Shortly after their Shark Tank appearance, Klimkowski and the team achieved profitability in 2016. DUDE Products then went on to experience remarkable growth. Through multi-million dollar advertising campaigns tied to major events, the brand has established itself and is poised to reach $500 million in sales within the next five years, continuing to meet its goal of wiping a billion butts per year.
Jeffrey Klimkowski
CFO, DUDE Products
First CFO Position: 2011
Notable previous companies:
- Deutsche Bank
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
ADAM ZAKI: You’ve spent an equal amount of time as CFO of DUDE Products as you did as an investment banker at Deutsche Bank — about 13 and a half years. What is the most beneficial takeaway from being an investment banker?
JEFFREY KLIMKOWSKI: First and foremost, it gave me a lot of perspective on what we needed to bring to the company initially. My work there taught me how to grow a business, how to stay disciplined and the meaning of financial discipline within a business, along with how to instill it. I believe many people give financial discipline a negative connotation, especially for CFOs, assuming we always say no to expenses and ideas. But I learned as an investment banker early on that isn’t always the case.
My work exposed me to perspectives from the best in the world: how successful companies manage their business operations, how the greatest private equity firms handle their investments, and the reasons why certain businesses are so meticulous and disciplined. But I also saw the value and benefits good discipline can bring when it comes to embracing flexibility and seizing opportunities.
I believe if you’re plan-oriented, you will know what to do when you’re in a position to succeed. Things like forecasting, looking forward, and planning things out are normal for CFOs and require a lot of discipline on their own. But I think it’s important to recognize those moments where you need to step outside of your plan and be flexible, like going out and spending a significant amount of money to capitalize on an opportunity.
“Our capital needs began to outgrow what we could all contribute, and that was the factor where I realized it was time to put all my time, not just my money, into the company.”
Jeffrey Klimkowski
CFO, DUDE Products
I always tell my team, and this is a lesson I learned as an investment banker, that we're disciplined and methodical in our planning and analysis, always updating our rolling forecasts and such, because if there's an opportunity that requires capital investment, we’re not caught on our heels. We can be in a position to say, "Yes, let’s spend that additional two or three million bucks that we weren’t planning on spending to seize this marketing or promotional opportunity."
Was there a moment during your time at Deutsche Bank when you realized it was time to dedicate all your working time to building your company?
KLIMKOWSKI: No, there wasn’t. I probably should’ve left two years earlier, but I always wanted to be an investment banker. I had worked my whole life up until that point for it. In high school, I was reading The Wall Street Journal in the mornings, and I chose my college because they had an investment banking workshop. It was my path, I was on it and I was so excited about it.
I will say my life back then was much different from today; I have a wife and three kids now, whereas back then, I was living with my buddies in a sort of post-college purgatory. My lifestyle has changed significantly since starting this company, and I've had a lot of time to reflect on this.
Me and my buddies, the other founders, got the entrepreneurial itch during that time when we were living together. We knew the window of opportunity to take a chance and build a business was finite, and I knew I’d regret not trying to start a business if I never did. So, I began doing investment banking and building the company at the same time.
“I haven’t had many challenges finding good finance and accounting talent. We have a tight-knit culture, so we don’t hire just anyone, but our marketing and brand reputation have helped us attract some talented people to work for us.”
Jeffrey Klimkowski
CFO, DUDE Products
When it started to become real was when I was using my bonuses at Deutsche Bank to help fund the company. And then it got to a point where my $50,000 to $100,000 bonus checks weren’t moving the needle on the business anymore. Our capital needs began to outgrow what we could all contribute, and that was the factor where I realized it was time to put all my time, not just my money, into the company. The timing all worked out and looking back on it, admittedly, it was tough at some points.
In 2016 Mark Cuban purchased a 25% stake in the company for $300,000 on Shark Tank — the only investor money you’ve ever gotten. What was that experience like after nearly a decade and over $100 million of growth later and what’s your team’s communication cadence with him and his team?
KLIMKOWSKI: Before we went on the show, we had a walk away point. Mark’s deal was the deal we wanted. You’ll notice in the episode we got a couple of other offers that we weren’t biting on because the one that Mark gave us was the deal we were looking for. That helped me a lot as a CFO because I didn’t have a ‘what did I just do’ moment; we all had a plan going in. We strategized and prepared for that appearance. I went on stage with a calculator because I wasn’t going to try to do mental math on television in front of a panel, but I was ready to answer whatever questions they had. We were ready.
Regarding Mark’s involvement, his team has been awesome partners and has had a significant influence on our growth. I can’t speak highly enough of the success of their investment. They’re as involved as we want them to be; it’s always been that way. As CFO, I do have to provide him with reports, figures, and updates on challenges we’re facing from time to time, but overall, they have never come knocking down the door to take over the business or anything like that.
As we’ve grown, Mark has become even more involved. He’s a great mentor and business advisor to us and has always been someone we can present ideas or solutions to challenges. He is someone we can bounce ideas of all types off of. He’s become an advisor to us as founders and has been incredibly helpful in our scaling processes. We don’t have a board or anything like that; it’s just us. So having someone like Mark in our corner has been invaluable to us as an organization.
You’ve grown dramatically in the digital age. As your finance and accounting needs have grown, have you turned to improving technology, hiring more people, or both?
KLIMKOWSKI: This is where everyone called us crazy. Early on, we went through a couple of enterprise resource management (ERP) systems, starting with QuickBooks. Then we moved to a new ERP system that I won’t name, but it was a complete disaster. It was a really bad experience for our business; it didn’t help us scale, and candidly, it made us regret not sticking with QuickBooks initially.
So in 2018, when we were only $9 million in revenue, we invested in NetSuite. Everyone told me I was stupid, that the company was too small for this and I was wasting money. It was the only year in the first ten years of the company that we didn’t double our revenue because we were implementing this new system.
Having that ERP system early allowed us to scale at the rate we did without issues. We had just under $50 million in revenue in 2021 with only four employees — the original co-founders. We relied heavily on technology, along with numerous third parties and consultants. When we added it up, it was like having 30-40 people working on our business, but full-time, it was just the four of us.
"It’s all about planning, budgeting, and forecasting — being on offense. I am an offensive CFO."
Jeffrey Klimkowski
CFO, DUDE Products
Now, we have built out our personnel to around 25 people. People want to work here; the brand is popular. I haven’t had many challenges finding good finance and accounting talent. We have a tight-knit culture, so we don’t hire just anyone, but our marketing and brand reputation have helped us attract some talented people to work for us.
You call yourself the chief financial dude. How do you have fun, be cool and enjoy the ride of entrepreneurial growth while also fulfilling your CFO duties of keeping the business in check and managing growth?
KLIMKOWSKI: Planning and discipline. We have many ideas coming from our marketing team. The most significant thing I try to emphasize to them is their involvement in creating their plan so they have ownership of it. When they deviate from plans and costs increase, we can identify what’s going on because everyone has a hand in it. We don’t just come up with ideas and worry about how to pay for them later.
I think there’s a scarcity mindset in larger organizations regarding owning budgets that we try to avoid. If you gain insights and feedback from teams that own the plan and have a vested interest in it, there’s a lot less conflict when I, as CFO, raise skepticism about plans.
But that applies equally to me. I need to be aggressive and notice opportunities that others may not. Recently, there was a business opportunity that some of our people, including some from our marketing team, were advising against. But I said, "No, guys, here's half a million dollars; let’s be aggressive and go seize this opportunity."
It’s all about planning, budgeting, and forecasting — being on offense. I am an offensive CFO. You know, we were the first toilet paper company to use the word “butt” in our advertising. I think that says a lot about how we approach things. We aren’t just digital anymore, focusing on internet growth and SEO; we are about our brand. Many on our team respect that; they see how we’re growing, which encourages a strong culture of open collaboration and idea-sharing among our current and future team members.